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What will it take to win the Archery World Cup Final in Dubai?

The top 4 archers in the world per category in 2007 qualified for the World Cup Final in Dubai. They beat a field of 500 archers to get there. What will it take now for them to win the big prize money and be sacred World Cup 2007 Winner?

To analyze the strengths of each athlete, we have prepared in depth statistics of their performances during the last two World Cup seasons (2006 and 2007). These statistics are available on the Dubai pages of www.archeryworldcup.org.

We will now draw attention to three essential points for the athletes to be successful in Dubai:

Ø The overall skill level of each athlete (looking at the average match score)

Ø The capacity to win a match against the other top archers participating in Dubai

Ø The capacity to adapt to a very special environment: in Dubai, the athletes will shoot for the first time on a platform over a lake. Moreover, they will have only 20 seconds to shoot one arrow instead of the usual 30 seconds.

Recurve Women

Two archers will have to settle an account at the World Cup Final. They are two talented young ladies. Although Choi Eun Young (KOR) has been more consistent with a 110.16 points average, this year she lost two of her three matches versus Natalya Erdyniyeva (RUS). The 19-year-old Russian and niece of Baljinima Tsyrempilov (!) has been the big surprise of the year, topping the World Cup ranking and winning a bronze medal at the Leipzig World Championships. But, how will she adapt to the conditions in Dubai?

The third contender is Dola Banerjee (IND) who should get a lot of support from the vast Indian community of Dubai. She just comes off a win at the last World Cup Stage in Dover, where she beat Zhang Juan Juan (CHN) 111-110 in the final. The Chinese is the fourth contestant in this category and she has one big advantage: she won last year’s World Cup Final in the heart of the Mayapan Pyramids in Mexico, and therefore, she already has the experience of such very special conditions. She scored 106 and 107 points to win in Mayapan. Although she lost versus all her Dubai opponents in 2007, she certainly is able to repeat as the World Cup Winner 2007!

Compound Women

This category sees again three athletes that were at the World Cup Final in Mexico last year: Jamie Van Natta from the USA and the Russians Anna Kazantseva and Sofia Goncharova. The fourth archer, Petra Ericsson (SWE), should not suffer from a deficit of experience: she has been successful at the elite level for more than 15 years! If Goncharova was simply unstoppable last year - winning the Final and three Stages – 2007 was different for her. At the 2006 Final she scored 111 and 112 points. This season she dropped one point in her match average (from 111.9 to 110.9) and lost to every one except Van Natta. Her team-mate and friend Kazantseva has an impressive 91.6% winning percentage and she claimed victory in two Stages this year (Ulsan and Antalya).

The Swedish Ericsson has the highest match average in 2007 with 113.58 and she has beaten Goncharova and Van Natta. The latter has been a model of consistence for the last two years with a lot of high results. She has faced only one problem: she never defeated Kazantseva or Goncharova. With a win at the last World Cup Stage in Dover, has Van Natta boosted her confidence enough to finally win the big prize?

Athletes often say that statistics are just the past; that what matters the most is the match to be played. Surely, what will matter the most is to adapt to the very special conditions of the World Cup Final in Dubai and to bring one’s very best archery as of the very first arrow! The show is therefore guaranteed!